crossmyheartandhope (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
crossmyheartandhope) wrote2021-01-12 08:46 pm
crossmyheartandhope) wrote2021-01-12 08:46 pm
Entry tags:
Memory 27: Scorched
It shouldn't be hard.
The ingredients are spread out on the counter in front of him: flour, milk, eggs, strawberries, and vanilla frosting.
His mother doesn't eat a lot of cake, but Hurricane knows she likes vanilla and strawberries. It's what Michaela always made for her birthday – only now Michaela's three hundred miles away, living in an apartment by her university, and here's Hurricane, with a mixing bowl and birthday candles and two hours until his mother gets home from work.
It shouldn't be hard.
He watched Michaela make the one for last year. He helped stir, even.
So he preheats the oven. He measures out the ingredients like he's doing a science experiment. When he realizes he didn't buy baking powder, he climbs up on the counter to look for it, a skinny nine-year-old boy in his bare feet, holding onto the lip of the cabinet so he doesn't tip over backward.
The baking powder's in the back corner, behind the peanut butter.
He measures it out, too, and he mixes everything together, and he sticks it in the pan in the oven.
When he's done, he starts on dinner – and this, at least, is genuinely easy. He's helped his sister make dinner way more than he's helped her make cake.
He moves through the steps on autopilot: chop the tomatoes and basil, bread the chicken and prep it for frying. He needs to boil the pasta, too, but it'll get cold if he starts it now, so he steps back from his progress to see what else needs doing.
He sets the table – puts out two cups, and two paper towels, and two forks. He checks the cake, and it's still not done.
There's still has an hour left before his mother gets home.
Hurricane peeks into the oven window at the cake again.
He puts the breaded chicken back in the fridge.
He wanders over to the couch – flops down on his back, feet dangling over one armrest, and puts on the tv for a couple of minutes, to kill some time.
The cartoon he finds when he flips through the channels is fast-paced and eye-catching. There are giant robots in space, and someone has to save the world.
He forgets all about the cake until he smells it starting to burn.
"Ah, hell," says Hurricane. He bangs his knee on the end table as he flings himself from the couch and scrambles for the kitchen.
There in the oven, the cake is on fire.
He yanks the oven door open with hasty fingers – makes a grab for the pan with his hands wrapped in a damp cloth. It burns him through the fabric, anyway; he yelps and drops it, and bits of char skitter off across the linoleum.
Overhead, the smoke detector starts to scream.
Hurricane seizes the pot of water he'd set aside for the pasta – hauls it around to throw it on the remnants of the cake and barely notices when his elbow catches the chopping board with the tomatoes and basil, dumping the whole thing onto the floor. The cake goes out in a hiss; more smoke rises in a rush up toward the ceiling.
As though on cue, the door swings slowly inward, and there's his mother, standing in the doorframe, expression beleaguered but not at all surprised.
"Jesus Christ, Jacob," she says, quietly.
"Sorry," he says. "Sorry. I was trying to –"
She lifts a hand, and he falls silent.
"Just clean it up," she says.
Hurricane swallows, hard. "Yeah," he says. "Sure."
By the time he gets down on his hands and knees to start picking up what's left of the cake, she's disappeared down the hall, into her room.
The ingredients are spread out on the counter in front of him: flour, milk, eggs, strawberries, and vanilla frosting.
His mother doesn't eat a lot of cake, but Hurricane knows she likes vanilla and strawberries. It's what Michaela always made for her birthday – only now Michaela's three hundred miles away, living in an apartment by her university, and here's Hurricane, with a mixing bowl and birthday candles and two hours until his mother gets home from work.
It shouldn't be hard.
He watched Michaela make the one for last year. He helped stir, even.
So he preheats the oven. He measures out the ingredients like he's doing a science experiment. When he realizes he didn't buy baking powder, he climbs up on the counter to look for it, a skinny nine-year-old boy in his bare feet, holding onto the lip of the cabinet so he doesn't tip over backward.
The baking powder's in the back corner, behind the peanut butter.
He measures it out, too, and he mixes everything together, and he sticks it in the pan in the oven.
When he's done, he starts on dinner – and this, at least, is genuinely easy. He's helped his sister make dinner way more than he's helped her make cake.
He moves through the steps on autopilot: chop the tomatoes and basil, bread the chicken and prep it for frying. He needs to boil the pasta, too, but it'll get cold if he starts it now, so he steps back from his progress to see what else needs doing.
He sets the table – puts out two cups, and two paper towels, and two forks. He checks the cake, and it's still not done.
There's still has an hour left before his mother gets home.
Hurricane peeks into the oven window at the cake again.
He puts the breaded chicken back in the fridge.
He wanders over to the couch – flops down on his back, feet dangling over one armrest, and puts on the tv for a couple of minutes, to kill some time.
The cartoon he finds when he flips through the channels is fast-paced and eye-catching. There are giant robots in space, and someone has to save the world.
He forgets all about the cake until he smells it starting to burn.
"Ah, hell," says Hurricane. He bangs his knee on the end table as he flings himself from the couch and scrambles for the kitchen.
There in the oven, the cake is on fire.
He yanks the oven door open with hasty fingers – makes a grab for the pan with his hands wrapped in a damp cloth. It burns him through the fabric, anyway; he yelps and drops it, and bits of char skitter off across the linoleum.
Overhead, the smoke detector starts to scream.
Hurricane seizes the pot of water he'd set aside for the pasta – hauls it around to throw it on the remnants of the cake and barely notices when his elbow catches the chopping board with the tomatoes and basil, dumping the whole thing onto the floor. The cake goes out in a hiss; more smoke rises in a rush up toward the ceiling.
As though on cue, the door swings slowly inward, and there's his mother, standing in the doorframe, expression beleaguered but not at all surprised.
"Jesus Christ, Jacob," she says, quietly.
"Sorry," he says. "Sorry. I was trying to –"
She lifts a hand, and he falls silent.
"Just clean it up," she says.
Hurricane swallows, hard. "Yeah," he says. "Sure."
By the time he gets down on his hands and knees to start picking up what's left of the cake, she's disappeared down the hall, into her room.